Who should prepare the plan? _ As a business consultant, this may sound like heresy, but I believe that any plan should be produced by the senior management of the organisation. That is not to say that the consultant does not have a role to play in its preparation. He does. Senior management should prepare the plan as they will then be able to present and discuss it, demonstrating to their audience that they fully understand their business and market. I believe that the consultant's role is to help facilitate the preparation of the plan, the consultant can help undertake the necessary research, and can cast a critical and impartial eye over the plan.

Right now, growth may sound like an unattainable goal as businesses are grappling just to survive, but hey, "flat is the new up." If a business can keep its doors open and lights on, then it's doing better than many others. But lights and open doors don't make sales, so making changes that attract business is in a sense, striving for growth. It won't be this tough forever, but for now, putting some growth strategies into action may be what keeps your business alive, if not thriving.

The expected revenues and expenses for at least a year should be projected in the cash flow section of the Financial Plan. It's better to make conservative predictions rather than be too optimistic when it comes to cash flows. As part of this section, a break_even analysis is essential. This is the "amount of units sold or sales dollars necessary to recover all expenses associated with generating these sales." (NxLevel for Entrepreneurs, 2005) The formula for calculating the break_even quantity is Total Fixed Costs/(Price _ Average Variable Costs).

The main thing to remember in this section is not to provide new data, but to explain in detail data that has already been provided and to provide the support for that data.